


stand unafraid

by annamatopia



Series: burning ropes and bridges [3]
Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Gen, Magic, Paranoia, References to Mind Control
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-20
Updated: 2014-09-20
Packaged: 2018-02-18 04:18:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,769
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2335013
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/annamatopia/pseuds/annamatopia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>natasha's not paranoid, really. but if she were under the influence of truth serum she might admit to a healthy dose of suspicion.</p>
            </blockquote>





	stand unafraid

**Author's Note:**

> follows watch me steady and hold me now.

If there is anything that Natasha has learned from the alien invasion of New York, it is that Magic is unpredictable. People, now-- _people_ are predictable. She can manipulate people into doing whatever she wants. Even mutants and super-powered individuals, like the Hulk or Captain America, are predictable on some level. At their very core they are still human.

Magic? Alien gods? Are foreign ground.

She finds herself watching her teammates. Watching for the slightest change in behavior that might signify they’ve been compromised. Avoiding Thor, because he is Loki’s brother, and she cannot risk that he could control her too. Every time she catches him sparring with Steve or Tony, or laughing with Clint over the mess they’ve made of the kitchen, or talking quietly with Bruce about--well, she doesn’t know, but probably science--she wants to scream at them to _stay away_.

She doesn’t know what to do. It’s entirely unreasonable--Thor has never given them any reason to believe he would hurt them, but she feels unsafe when he is in the room. Her skin crawls and the back of her neck prickles and she can’t sit anywhere but with her back against the wall and her eyes fixed on him.

It would be easier, she thinks, if she could predict him, manipulate him like she can her other marks. She has no idea what he’s going to do at any given time.

Because, well--sometimes Thor will eat an entire case of poptarts for breakfast or beat Clint and Tony at Mario Kart for the twentieth time, but sometimes he will sit on the roof of Stark’s tower, feet dangling over the edge, while a vicious storm beats against Manhattan. Natasha knows this because she keeps vigilant watch on the simultaneously more and less predictable weather. More-so because when she can observe Thor, she can rationalize what’s going on outdoors. Less so because every once in awhile hurricane-strength winds will whip through the city or rain will slash through her view from her bedroom and she’s tiptoeing around the elephant in the room, the god with the power to control the weather, who could kill them all with his magic hammer.

As an assassin who once killed a man with nothing but a paperclip and a gummy bear, this is terrifying.

And, alright, on some level she knows she’s obsessing. She is aware enough about the world to know that the chances of another situation where a god uses magic to mind-control her best friend are pretty insignificant. But it’s in her nature to expect the worst so she can be pleasantly surprised when it doesn’t happen.

So it’s a total surprise when Thor manages to sneak up on her. She has _no_ idea how a man who is six and a half feet tall and built like a linebacker could _possibly_ be capable of sneaking up on a super-spy, but. There it is.

“You’ve been watching me,” he says, arms crossed over his chest while Natasha pretends she wasn’t startled. And she is _very much not interested_ in having sex with an alien god, but in the words of Darcy Lewis, _damn_ those arms are fine as hell, and also look like they could break her neck, if he were so inclined. She’s not admiring. Just. Sizing up the competition.

In any case, there’s no point in beating around the bush. She _has_ to know. “Do you use magic?”

Thor touches the hammer at his side, his brow pinched and mouth turned down. “I have used it, yes, though I am not as skilled as some.”

“So the only... _magic_ you can do is weather related?” she asks. Certainly she’s never seen him do anything else, and it would set her mind to rest if she knew he couldn’t.

“I am primarily a traditional warrior, as you can see--” He pats the hammer and gestures at his chest, where she knows he generally wears armor. “--But I do have some small skill with _sei∂r.”_

_Sei∂r,_ the norse term for magic. Let it never be said that she does not do her research. “Explain,” she demands. “What can you do? Is there a limit on the amount of power you can draw?”

“Indeed. Magic has rules,” he says, holding out his hand. “For instance, I cannot create something out of nothing, though I can create an illusion, and if I were my--” He stops himself, purses his lips, and then continues, “If I were more skilled, I could create illusions that could pass as physical objects.” He whispers onto his palm and a golden light swirls from his breath into a flower that she doesn’t recognize.

Natasha can’t take a breath. 

“What about--mind control? Is that--”

The flower disappears and he cuts her off with a gentle hand to her wrist. “I must confess that I am unversed in that particular discipline.” If he wrapped his hand around the thickest part of her arm, his fingers would still touch. She can’t stop thinking through what would happen if he tried. Whether she could even take him down.

“So you know nothing about it.” To her own ears, her voice sounds flat and apathetic.

Thor grimaces. “It is difficult to explain. I do not believe your language has the right words for the concepts, though as I understand, your science and mathematics come close.”

Natasha remembers Tony ranting about magic that one time they watched _Lord of the Rings_ for ‘team bonding.’ He had quoted an author with whom Natasha had been unfamiliar, but Thor’s fumbling for words brings it back to mind. “Sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic,” she says.

She is rewarded with a blinding smile. “There is truth to that saying, yes. Oft have I heard the son of Stark speak of bridging the gap between your technology and mine, but I fear he has yet a long way to go before he comes close.”

She smirks. Tony is notorious for starting impossible projects and then actually completing them, so she would not be surprised to find some sort of magic-technology mix gizmo in his workshop within the next year or so. She wonders if Thor knows this, if he has encountered the brash buzz of Tony’s fever for all things science. Often he barrels right over anyone in his way and she finds no shame or cowardice in getting out of his way and letting him tornado his ideas. She has no idea what to do with him otherwise, and from what she has seen of Thor when this occurs, he feels the same.

At least they find common ground in that respect.

In the lull, Natasha has a startling thought. “Did your brother actually fuck a horse?”

Thor stares at her for _at least_ thirty seconds and Natasha fears she’s offended him somehow, but then he throws his head back and laughs, full-body. When he finally answers, there are a few tears in the corner of his eye. “ _Sestrenka_ , myths are very often built on truth, but _that_ story is unfounded on all counts.”

_Sestrenka. Little sister._ It takes a moment for her to realize, but he’s speaking in Russian. Pure, flawless Russian, straight from the mouth of a native speaker. She tenses, ready to fight or flee should the situation require it. “How are you doing that?”

Thor smiles, a little. “Allspeak. You hear my words in the tongue most familiar to you. I am surprised this has not come to your attention before now, though I think you have not spoken to me enough to notice,” he says, a little reproachfully, and she feels a twinge of guilt.

“I’m truly sorry for the misunderstanding,” she begins, but Thor cuts her off with a wave of his hand.

“Humans I get, aliens are just crazy?” he says, kindly, in a way that makes Natasha suspect he is misquoting something he watched with Tony. There are crinkles at the corners of his eyes and he looks _exactly_ like an anthropomorphized golden retriever. Honestly, it’s hard to remember why she ever saw him as a threat.

“Exactly,” she agrees.

Thor grins. “Then, Lady Natasha, let us make haste to the kitchen. Our shield-mates have been engaged in baking sweets all afternoon, and I believe if we hurry there may be some left.”

No, there’s no possible way she could ever imagine Thor controlling them as his brother did. He’s much too concerned over the state of affairs in the kitchen, where he fights daily battles with Clint and Tony over the last poptart, oreo, or box of Lucky Charms.

She trails after him to the kitchen and stops in the doorway. Every flat surface--and some vertical surfaces--is covered with a heavy dusting of flour. Steve and Tony seem to be the main culprits, being the two most dirty, but Bruce is sitting at the table with a book and Clint is perched on top of--oh god. The fridge.

“What. Happened,” she says, in her best Fury impression.

Thor glances back at her, then at the mess. “My friends, I see that you are yet engaged in your--” He hesitates. “I will be back shortly.” With that, he beats a hasty retreat.

“Thank _god_ ,” Tony says loudly over the sound of Thor’s retreating footsteps. “ _That_ elephant’s out of the way. I thought we were all going to suffocate under it.”

“What elephant?” Natasha says, but it’s only to buy time. She knows they know. She hasn’t exactly been covert about her observations of Thor, but maybe she’s slipping if they’ve seen paranoia.

Steve, standing at the edge of the counter with a massive bowl of cookie dough and a wooden spoon longer than his forearm, scowls at Tony. “It’s really none of your business.”

Tony throws a dish towel at Steve, who ducks and blushes fiercely. Natasha thinks there’s something going on there, but honestly she would rather not know. Ever. “I’ve been living in an ice cube since Thor came back, Steve. A Natasha-shaped ice cube. That can kill me with her pinky finger so I’m just going to shut up now,” he backpedals, because Natasha’s fixed him with a glare that could melt glaciers.

“Wise man,” she says cooly.

So, maybe things won’t be perfect. She’s never going to stop worrying about the inevitable and checking her teammates for signs of possession or mind control, but Thor has now skimmed off the top of her paranoia. Natasha will sleep well tonight.

But really. Cosmic golden retriever who wilts at the sight of sweets.


End file.
